The group of officers left the yard tired, dirty, and thoughtful. Ana hadn't said another word about her background, but none of them had questioned her fitness as an instructor once she really got started. She’d shown them, and had them practice, how to avoid being grabbed and how to control a human opponent, but the meat of the class had been on how to permanently disable or kill. She couldn't rely on the opponent's inborn reflexes to avoid pain and injury, so she'd focused on how to mechanically break a body. How to cause hypovolemic shock in seconds, including how long it would take for different targets. Which major nerves and tendons could be most easily cut to disable limbs. How to destroy joints. All the things that she'd idly thought about and read up on, and been taught to avoid, to never do because of the legal consequences unless her own life or that of her charge was in immediate danger. She explained and demonstrated, and her students grew quieter and quieter.
When Ana demonstrated how to sever the aorta or pierce the heart from beneath the rib cage, the same thing she’d done to Larry the Rogue on her first day in the splinter, Simt had looked queasy. When Ana showed how to twist a knee to tear the ligaments, the woman threw up in the dust. The Kineticist’s magical talents lent themselves well to warding off or disabling opponents rather than killing them quickly, but she had an empathic streak that made Ana glad that she lacked any of her own. When Ana had her practice various attacks at low power, Simt hesitated every time. She would need to overcome that, at least for short moments at a time, if she wanted to survive.
“Fucking hell, Ana,” Petra whispered as some of them made their way to the baths. When she looked at Ana there was a little of that anxiety in her eyes that Ana was so familiar with. “How did you learn all of that shit?”
“Study and practice,” was all Ana said, and Petra let it drop.
Tellak didn't treat Ana any differently. “How far did you get?” she asked.
“With what?”
“Your practice. Drawing mana.”
“I don't know. It felt good. I could connect pretty easily last time. But I didn't get a Skill.”
“That's normal. Drawing naturally aligned mana is a skill, but not a Skill. You won't get Channeling until you start practicing with ambient, unaligned mana.”
“Is that the next step?”
“Normally it would be, but we don’t have time. There's plenty of easily accessible Earth mana here, with the Waystone misbehaving.” She paused and looked at Ana thoughtfully. “I would like to get you started with shaping.”
Ana felt a surge of excitement, and Tellak gave her a wry smile. “And you should probably start learning to control what you project, too.”
“Yeah, I’ll get on that during my copious free time.” The schedule that Pirta had given her, and which Ana had implicitly agreed to, had her busy from an hour after sunrise to sunset, with a break to eat at midday. “Will you have time for me after dinner tomorrow?”
“Come to Touanne's, and I’ll make time.”
“So you're, what? Living there now?”
“Practically, yes. We can't risk Touanne getting hurt if Jancia has another… episode. Jancia can't hurt me when I’m strengthening myself. And Touanne herself needs support.”
“You’re really good friends, aren't you?”
“We are. But even if we weren’t she's sacrificed a lot to be here. She could be getting rich and leveling quickly in the Primes, but she chose to come here, to help. I respect that choice deeply. Besides—” Tellak shrugged. “She’s easy to like.”
The next day passed in a blur. Messy came over to Petra’s to have breakfast together. They'd see each other during the time slot just before noon, but as Messy pointed out it wasn't like they'd be able to talk then.
“I missed you, you know that?” Messy said as they were finishing their tea. “I know it was only a couple of nights, but my bed felt pretty cold and empty last night.”
“I didn't want to bother you.” It had been properly late when Ana got out of the baths.
“I don't care if you wake me. Come over any time, all right?”
Despite everything, like her worry about how Messy would react to their first class together, Ana felt a little warm and fuzzy inside hearing that.
The first four classes went as smoothly as could be expected. There was at least one person and sometimes more who questioned her qualifications, but a few demonstrations shut them up. Especially once she introduced the brushes.
She got the idea from either Gladiator or Spartacus — she couldn't remember which. When she arrived that morning she’d asked the guy at the counter in the guardhouse to get her a bunch of heavy duty paintbrushes and some kind of thick paint. He’d delivered by the beginning of her second class. During that second class, which was Tellak's group, a tall, particularly obnoxious woman had repeatedly questioned what a smallish, low-level social Classer could possibly teach them about fighting.
“That's your hand gone,” Ana declared as she pinned the woman to the ground. She held one arm up to show the red line she'd painted spiraling up the forearm from the wrist. “You or any other human would be unconscious in one to two minutes, not accounting for Attributes or Abilities. And with all the tendons cut, the hand would be useless. Not too reliable against an opponent who might be trying to bite you, though; two minutes is an eternity in a fight.” Ana released the woman. “Again.”
“Two to five seconds,” she declared after the next attempt. She’d had the woman dip her fingers in the same paint, but Ana still didn't have a speck on her. The woman getting to her feet from where Ana had thrown her, however, had a large red splotch on her rough tunic, right above her heart. “That's how long it takes for a human to go down if you pierce their heart. I don't recommend it as a target, though. It's easy to miss, and your weapon may get stuck in the ribs. Better to go for the throat.”
The woman's eyes went wide as Ana stalked forward, leading with the brush. She was a level 11 Fighter and almost as tall as Waller, but she took an involuntary step back before she set her face and lunged, one hand going for Ana’s wrist while the other went for her throat.
Ana stopped and twisted, let her overextend, then helped her along while simultaneously painting a thick, red line across her throat.
“See?” she asked the group silently watching them, as the Fighter brought her hand up to her throat, a hollow look in her eyes. “A much easier target. But it could be five to ten seconds before they go down for good, depending on the cut, so put them on the ground or put some distance between you until that happens.”
The woman looked near tears. Her voice was hoarse when she asked, “Who the fuck are you?”
“I’m a level 9 social Classer,” Ana replied drily. “I just have skills, not Skills, outside of that. I suggest you lose the idea that level and Class decide if someone is dangerous. Our enemies have neither.”
“But how do you move like that? I don’t—”
“Again. I have skills that you may not expect. I have learned those skills while training to protect people from other people, which I’ve done my entire adult life.” And she had all of those Attributes, which made it child’s play to avoid someone making a mad grab for her, but she wasn’t going to tell them that. “If what I’ve demonstrated just now looks impossible to do yourselves, I have good news. I don’t expect you to. I just want you to get used to ‘stabbing’ each other while not getting grabbed. Now pair up. One of you will be the crazy. You’ll have paint on your fingers, and you’re trying to scratch or bite your opponent. The other will have a brush. I want you to try to paint the crazy, but your primary job is to not get scratched or bitten. We’ll go for a while, then we’ll switch, then we’ll rotate partners. Mages, if you can use your Craft without actually injuring your partner, go for it. Tomorrow we’ll look at breaking joints.”
The yard was still and silent. Not even Tellak made a move to get started. “Well?” Ana snapped, pushing on both her Command and Intimidation Skills. “We don’t have all fucking day! Get to it!”
By the end of her fourth class, Ana had picked up the Teaching Skill.
It was kind of ridiculous; most of what she’d done had been to bully anyone who questioned her, terrify everyone else, and then yell at them until they at least made an honest attempt to follow her instructions. She had no idea how actually useful anything she taught them would be, either. Out of the fifty-odd people she’d instructed so far, only two had any skill with or interest in short blades, which was the only thing she’d used in her classes. Everyone else used swords, axes, hammers, spears, bows, slings, a variety of other weapons — including what had sounded like a bloody scythe — or goddamn magic.
Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.
Most of them seemed to be picking up where to aim. That was something. And Ana was sure that they had the numbers to fight off or through the crazies if necessary. But most of them, officers and conscripts, flinched and hesitated even during friendly spars. That was the kind of thing that would break them if they were outnumbered.
It was frustrating, but it wasn't like she could teach them to see people as things. They'd just have to spar more.
The arrival of the fifth group marked the end of Ana’s short break. This was Petra's group, and Ana was at least acquainted with most of them. Including the three “extras.”
“Hello, Waller,” Ana said. She approached the tall man after first talking to Messy, who had her hair up in the same multitude of tight braids as when they went on the Delve, and then to Petra. Waller had apparently made a small fuss the previous evening. He hadn’t liked being thrown in with a casuals’ group. Petra said that she had shut that down quickly, but it was still a problem.
Waller had been talking to his two… what, exactly? Friends? Flunkies? As he turned to look at Ana, his face twisted into a scowl. His lips parted, probably to say something idiotic, but then she caught his eyes and he froze. Just stopped completely, like a rabbit caught in the open.
Goddamn, Ana loved Predator and Arresting Gaze right then.
Waller recovered. Surprisingly he didn't try to salvage his no doubt savaged pride with bluster or posturing. “What do you want?” he said flatly. After a heartbeat he added, “Miss Cole.”
Ana met his petulance with affected sweetness. “Just making sure that everyone’s happy. I don't want any disruptions in my class, all right?”
“Yeah. All right.”
“The same goes for you two,” she said, turning Waller’s two hangers-on. “Trig, right?” she said to the woman.
“Yes, Miss.”
“And… sorry, don’t think I ever caught your name.”
“Ah, Sylt, Miss,” the man said. “Well, she’s Trilgayeri and I’m Syltfer, but…” He trailed off under Ana’s gaze. “No trouble from us, Miss.” Beside him, Trig nodded rapidly.
“Good. I’m glad that we understand each other.”
Ana hoped that they meant what they said. In theory the three should be a significant asset to any group. Waller was a Fighter, Trig a Scout, and Sylt a Rogue. They hadn’t been idle since the last time Ana saw them, when Ana choked Waller out for trying to shake her down; Trig was level 9 now, having gone up a level. While level 9 and 10 weren’t very high, the three were still on a whole different level from any human back home. But Ana had serious doubts about their reliability, and she hoped that Petra would keep a careful eye on them.
With her authority established, Ana gathered everyone to begin the class. The whole team from the Delve was there, except Rayni and Kaira, of course.
God, she hoped Rayni was okay out there on her own.
With them, besides Waller, Trig and Sylt, were two women Ana had never seen before — volunteers, both human, both of a similar age to herself. One was a Barmaid (13), and looked like she might have wandered out of an Oktoberfest beer tent or some valkyrie opera, with her impressive build and long, blonde braids. The other, a slender woman with cropped black hair and beautifully smooth, reddish ochre skin, was a Courtesan (12). That surprised Ana more than it should have. Not her Class itself, but the fact that she’d volunteered. The Barmaid looked tough. The Courtesan very much did not.
At least there shouldn’t be any problems with motivation from those two. In choosing to volunteer, they had already shown more willingness than anyone who’d been conscripted. There was the question of how effective they’d be, but they were there, looking attentive and determined, and Ana had a tentatively good feeling about them. Besides, appearances meant little here. For all she knew the Courtesan could have focused entirely on her physical Attributes.
“It’s good to see you all again,” she began, looking at her companions from the Delve. “It’s been a while. Now, you’ve all seen me fight, but this is going to be different from the Delve. Here, we’ll be focusing on fighting people. You—” she turned to Waller and the other two, “have some more relevant experience with what I can do.”
Dilmik and Denikla, who was now an Evoker (5), gave their three temporary teammates dirty looks.
“Can’t believe we got stuck with those buttholes instead of Mirry and Ron,” Deni muttered. Ana knew Deni meant her two friends Mirell and Varron, the Fighter and Archer she intended to form a Party with once the crisis was over. They’d been assigned to Team 7, under Tarkan.
Ana ignored the grumbling. “You two.” She pointed at the volunteers. “I’m Anastasia, and I'm pretty new here. Mind introducing yourselves?”
“Braggie. Ah, Braglinn, I mean,” said the Barmaid. Her voice quivered with a nervousness that she'd hidden well so far. “I work at the Wayfarer’s Rest, serving drinks and such.”
“Sadie,” continued the Courtesan. Her voice was light and airy, but more confident than Braglinn’s. With a glint in her eye she added, “You can all see my Class. If any of you want to find me when I’m working, well, there’s only two establishments in the outpost. Just ask for me.”
“Not the time or place to advertise. Braglinn, Sadie, why did you volunteer?”
“Braggie’s got a heroic streak.” Sadie answered for the both of them as the Barmaid blushed. “She doesn’t look it, but she’ll step in the moment someone gets rowdy. And I wasn’t going to let her jump into something like this on her own, so here we are.”
Ana shot a questioning look at Braglinn, who nodded. “I tried to talk her out of it, but…”
“But that wasn’t going to happen. And you weren’t gonna change your mind, so now we’re doing this.” Sadie turned to Ana. “Sorry for holding up the class. Please.”
“Okay! I’m Anastasia Cole. Some of you know me better than the rest, but that makes no difference. I’ll be trying to teach you all the same two things: to survive, and to kill. Does anyone doubt that I’m capable of either?”
She scanned the line, pausing on each person in turn. No one spoke up. Messy looked excited. Trig the Scout fidgeted where she stood, and Sylt the Rogue wouldn’t meet her eyes. “Good. Since everyone’s behaving, I don’t have anyone I need to make an example of. But I still need a partner to demonstrate what we’ll be working on today. Sadie, if you’d step up here, please?”
The Courtesan looked surprised and didn’t move immediately, but when everybody started looking at her she joined Ana at the front of the class.
“Here.” Ana picked up her pot of bright red paste, dipped a brush, and held it out. “Dip your fingers in this, then try to touch me.”
In the line, Messy pouted.
Sadie turned out to be quick and agile, with good reflexes. Not good enough to land a mark, but impressively close at some points. She was barely breathing hard when they finished the demonstration, though the dust on her face was cut by streaks of sweat. She smiled at Ana when Ana asked them all to pair up to practice. “That was more rough and tumble than I usually agree to,” she said, “but pretty fun! Would you be willing to show me some more, when this is all over?”
“Ah, maybe? Which part?”
“All of it! The throwing, the holding, the dodging. Maybe the knife stuff, too? I could pay you.”
Ana considered it. Teaching martial arts wasn’t anything she’d ever really considered, but now that she’d been pushed into it she had to admit that she’d had a pretty good morning. “Tell you what,” she said. “I’ll think about it. It’s not the first time I’ve been asked. If I decide to do it, I’ll put up a notice on the board in the guardhouse. Now, get started! You can pair up with Braglinn to start with.”
This group had ten people in it, so they could form even pairs, leaving Ana to walk around and observe and instruct. The militia teams varied in size, with the smallest being only nine people, and the previous group having had fourteen. It mostly seemed to be an uneven distribution of volunteers. Ana disagreed with that approach; she’d prefer if the group sizes were as even as possible. But there must be some reason for it. All the volunteers in each group so far had known each other, so probably Pirta or whoever did the assignments wanted to use pre-existing bonds to motivate them to fight harder, or something.
As she watched the pairs at work, Ana saw the same thing as in all her previous groups: the mages had trouble both attacking and defending. In this case it was the two Evokers; Sendra, focused on water, and Denikla, who had just reset her Class and was focused on the same combination of fire and lightning as Kaira. Everyone else, including the two volunteers, were quicker and more agile than them, and they both had streaks of red paint on their arms and their rough training clothes. Of course, if they could use their magic things would be very different, but magic took time and focus to cast. They would need to protect their mages carefully. That was standard, but the situation wasn’t. Delving groups always strove to outnumber their opponents; it was uncommon to face more than one demon at a time, and when Ana and the others had walked into a fight with multiple enemies on their Delve, they almost got wiped out.
Denikla was making a valiant attempt to land a hit with her brush on Messy. Ana couldn’t tell if Deni had given up on avoiding getting hit herself, or if she was just that badly outclassed. It looked like she’d decided that all she could do was to accept a loss and try and take Messy down with her.
The girl was, what? Sixteen? Ana prayed that she’d never have to face one of the crazies hand-to-hand. It’d be a goddamn tragedy.
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